2060
by Mackinaw Weasel
Summary: The year is twenty-sixty and war has been waged for the last forty years between Sanctuaries across the world in a desperate attempt to capture all three cradles of magic. Ireland, Africa, and Australia. Fear not, Skulduggery and Valkyrie are on the case, with a somewhat derelict teen following close behind.
1. Chapter 1

**!XxxxxXxxxxX!**

**Warning: This story may offend some people, it contains a lot of casual swearing.**

**!XxxxxXxxxxX!**

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This story just came to me recently and I wanted to experiment in a different writing style that strongly reflects the central character. You will notice there are made up words, and intentional spelling mistakes - this is because Phoenix the Ash pronounces words this way. But if you do come across something that's a little bit far-fetched then review or pm me :) I'm more than happy to give more clarity.

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**Chapter bloody One: I friggin get caught**

Well the world, I'm telling you, it ain't what it used to be. It ain't green (unless you count that green sludge in the ol' Thames) and it ain't all clear sunny skies and the likes either. Nah. It's a real shit hole. But I bet it prolly don't even smell _that_ good.

But today the world was being a right dog's mother to me. I was cuffed painfully tight, my magic gone, and waiting for the two Irish Sanctuary dicks to stop shouting at each other over me. It'd be going on for a minute now and I'd finally had it up to here with their yakking, so I told them to shut the fuck up.

I got a shoe in the ribs for my effort and I keeled pathetically to my side.

Well that's fucking gracious, I began thinking bitterly, just kick out my liver why don't ya? It's just a bastard of an organ anyways, always acting up and shit. Don't really need it to fuckin live or anything.

They're still yelling. The skeleton dude's arguing bout some sort of blown up Bentley.

I blew up a Bentley once. I regret it. I like nostalgic crap as much as the next antique dealer. Not. Still, it was a pretty car.

Aw shit. It was _his_ car.

He's telling me I'll be lucky to even have a trial. He ain't got no face skin, but I reckon if he did he'd be livid.

The woman urges me to my feet, grabbing my cuffs and twisting them painfully. At least she apologises bout the rough treating. I give her a jerk of the chin to say it didn't bother me in the least. She seemed cool with the response, told me that the bone dude would calm down in a bit.

I get lead to an old black jag, and get pushed inside.

**!XxxxxXxxxxX!**

I can't tell if the Grand Mage guy is happy or angry to see me caught, but his beakish face is flashing red and white like an Ambo siren light. He's talking really fast to the detective, Skulduggery, now that I know his name, and the chick detective, Valkyrie. It all seems so important so I tune out. Then the quite guy with the scars turns to me.

"Why did you supply all those explosives to Venom," he asked me darkly, glaring under that cliff of a brow of his.

I shrugged. "I just make 'em. What they're used for is not my doing, nor do I really care."

"You do understand that there is a war going on," Valkyrie gal says, staring at me all concerned-like.

"'Course I do," I snap at them, "would you think I'd be making much business if there weren't?"

I get thrown in jail.

**!XxxxxXxxxxX!**

Some hours later the door to my cell opens and Valkyrie steps in all cleaned up after our little scuffle when they took me down. I still had shit all over me. Hell, I had dirt _on _my dirt. Someone could prolly sow a row of seeds and grow a garden off me I was that covered in muck.

"Hey," she says, almost kindly, but cautiously. She's looking round the cell as if there's so much to see.

"S'up."

"So, you're a bomb monger?"

"Yeah. So?"

"That's a dangerous job for someone your age," she saying.

I snort. "I ain't a kid."

"You look, what, twenty-two."

"Nineteen. It's the mileage."

"Ah," she looked me up and dark with her pretty dark eyes. "The council tells me that they'll consider your release if you're willing to reveal certain locations and information."

I'm frowning. "You want me to, what, tell you stuff that'll have me killed the moment I step out of here?" I snort loudly. "Fuck off."

Valkyrie wrinkled her nose. "You're not a very polite person are you?"

"It's the wild in me," I says matter-of-factly. I was glad she was offended by my way of sprekkening. Made me think I was doin something right.

Skulduggery storms in. I don't even move as he storms towards me, his boots threatening to lunge at my face as I calmly look upit him.

"What?"

"I very much liked my Bentley," he says coldly and I shrug.

"Ditto. Don't see 'em much round now-a-days. But it's war, dude, if you ain't noticed it doesn't really care what goes up in flames. Men, women, kiddies, BANG! All gone. If ya crying over a car then you ain't got much a soul."

He sighs real heavy like and glances at Valkyrie who nods. "Right," he turns back to me. "So what is going to be, Phoenix the Ash? Help and maybe you live to see the end of the war, or hinder us and stay here to see the end of the war behind bars."

"Tch," I spat on the floor in front of his shoe. "If I didn't need ta spread my wings daily I'd give no second thought on your offer of death."

I got no reply from the skeleton who left as quick as he had arrived, Valkyrie seemed to look at me and sigh. Closing the cell door.

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**Inspired somewhat by Clockwork Orange :D**

**And yup, Phoenix the Ash is a total asshole. I aim to annoy ;P**

**Please review with your thoughts! Cheers guys! :D**


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter Two: Signing on a derelict **

Skulduggery paced the room, his body taught like that of a strung bow, ready to fire at any sign of movement. He was clicking his tongue fervently.

"If we know the whereabouts of Venom Adder then we'll have the first leg up on regaining the African Cradle," he said, hollow eyes gazing steadily at the disintegrating carpet below his polished shoes. "His establishment holds the barriers in place and houses the ammunition. A strike team on him would give us a chance to overwhelm them, stop them from building that god-forsaken amplifier." He looked up at Valkyrie who had been watching him silently from her perch atop his desk. "Thoughts?"

"How do we plan on breaking the barrier when we find it? If you remember the Delta Team from twenty-twentyfour then I'm sure you're aware that they _evaporated_ when they _accidently_ stumbled across it." Valkyrie ran a hand through her long, dark hair. "And I don't know about you Skulduggery but I _like_ not being evaporated. Slow deaths are more my style. Gives me time to think."

Skulduggery had stopped in his tracks and cocked his head, listening. "Mmm," he agreed quietly. "It's a dilemma."

"But we know that there's a shipping port that Phoenix the Ash delivers to," Valkyrie continued. "It's cliché, but we could hijack a shipment."

"They haven't taken shipments since twenty-fortytwo, Valkyrie," he said with a sigh. "Everything since then they obtain through individual and specialty sale."

Valkyrie raised her eyebrows. "And?"

Skulduggery looked at her inquiringly. "And, what?"

"And so we really, _really _need Phoenix the Ash to like us."

Skulduggery muttered heatedly under his breath.

"What was that?" Valkyrie leaned forward on the desk, ear outstretched. "Something about some idiot leaving his Bentley on the side of the road in the worst part of town?"

"Valkyrie, I'm not taking on some derelict child. If I remember correctly I have _you_ for that!"

"Oh _ouch_!" Valkyrie gave him a hurt expression. "I don't know if you've noticed Skullers, but I'm sixty-eight now."

Skulduggery was silent for a moment. "Are you really!?"

Valkyrie's face fell. "You're kidding, right?"

"Well that settles everything. The kid is _your _responsibility Valkyrie," he gave an airy chuckle and left the room with a wave of his gloved hand. "Good luck trying to tame a wild child!"

Valkyrie fumed silently to herself, hopped off the desk and went to search for Ghastly.

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**Slight change of perspective :)**


	3. Chapter 3

**A stupid chapter third: Rich people have a room for shittin in**

The door opened uppy again and the woman detective enters with this begrudgy mask on her pretty face. She has clothes folded under her arms and she stands at the doorway looking at me with a scowl.

"Well, come on," she says dully, waving an open hand through the door like I was a pet dog being let outta the house. "It's my job to have you looking a bit more professional if you're going to be working alongside us."

It was the Grand Mage's bath room I found me following Valkyrie into, all done up shinier than a polished penny. I walked around the massive room in amazement.

"Ain't seen so much white, in, _ever_."

"Really," Valkyries says in surprise. "Bathrooms are usually white in some respect."

"Not the ones I seen," I touched the tiles. They felt cold. "Rooms for washing and crappin in are what 'em rich people gots in Londers. I saw it in a book, ye." I fiddled with a silver knob that protruded from the wall; it had a red ring around the middle of it. I looked at it closely. "Izis hot water?"

Valkyrie placed some clothes down on the toilet lid and nods at me. "Of course."

"Coolio," I murmurs, turning the knob all the way it can go. "Never had a shower with boiling water before." The water shoots out of this flat nozzle above me and pummels me wet. It gets real hot real quick and I jump out from under it. "Is it gotta be that hot?"

Valkyrie walked over fast and turned the knob back the other way, then turned on another one beside it. She sighed. "You have to use both hot and cold water, Phoenix."

"Oh yer," I jumped back under the nice water, I peel up my shirt.

"Did you want me to step out-?"

I'd already taken my shirt of and stood facing her with my arms opened, she looked away quickly as I laughed. It took her a moment to look back at me.

"How did you get that?" she asked sadly, looking at my impressive chest filled with deep warrior-like scars.

"Car blew up when I was a kiddie. My dad's bones shredded me to bits. It ain't bad," I shrug, "could've had all my shit exploding out of me too. It's just scars now."

"Still, it's a bit sad," she saids with a frown, "and you look like a man."

I grinned and flexed my abs. "Yeah? Pretty slick, huh? I dressed as a soldier and got meself plenty a pretty filly once."

Valkyrie's eyebrows shot to her hairline.

I laugh and took off my sopping jeans. "I got 'em drunk enough to take me home then I flog their crap. Never see it coming, and it works too often not to take advantage of. All chick down here though," I bang the front of my boxers. "Nothin, there."

The dark woman sighs. "Charming, you are."

"I know," I grin big and step out from under the water, grabbin this soft white towel hanging beside me. I rub my face in it. The towel gets dirty.

"No, no," Valkyrie sighs, motioning for me to go back into the rain fall, she grabs a sponge and the scented rock and begins to scrub my back fiercely. "Lean your head forward."

I obeys, looking at the dark water swirl around my feet and disappear. When she does my back, she does my hair and more brown water runs from it. She turns me around and puts the sponge and rock on my scarry chest.

"You can do the rest," she says sternly. "And be thorough about it. I don't want you smelling like you do when you're finished."

"Yea, ay. All right." I snap, scrubbing my shoulders real good.

I pretty much had to be given the once over before I could put these 'special clothes' on cuz Valkyrie wouldn't have them soiled by my tarry skin. She sent me back to the showers twice and finally, on the third time, I got to get dressed.

I pulled on this awesome black jacket that straddled my broad shoulders like a bull rider. "Aw, this fits swell."

"Complements of Elder Ghastly."

"I'll be sure to complement hisself then." I pulled on these bad assery looking boots and saw that Valkyrie was studying me for a moment too long. "Fancy me, do ya?" I asks, doin up the shoe laces. I sit up and dry the short spikes of my hair with a hand.

"No. You're just different."

"Coolio." I walked to her and took the slight of her hands in my rough ones and touched it to my lips with a grin. "It's just you wouldn't be the first lil lady I charms."

She frowned and flicked her hand out from mine. "_Really_?" She said incredulously. "Phoenix, I'm sixty-eight for Christ's sake, get your gear on and _stop_ mucking about. There's serious work to do."

I jump back in shock. "Sixty-eight, miss, for reals?"

"Yes," she frowns hard at me. "Now make me look good and _behave_."

"Ay ay," I grumble, following her sexy old guts out the room.

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**:D**


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter Four: Always At War**

Skulduggery looked up from the many maps the littered his large, luxurious mahogany desk. There was a sense of amusement about the way he shifted his weight expectantly.

"So," he said, as Valkyrie closed the door behind her with a long sigh, "How did it go?"

Valkyrie pinched her nose. "Oh, she's a case."

"_She_?"

"Seriously, Skulduggery?" Valkyrie drew up a chair and flopped into it. "Do you even know a woman when you see one anymore? Even I could tell."

"Hmm," he replied with a shrug. "Well, there you go."

"I've got her cleaning out a room for herself." Valkyrie stretched backwards, looking up at the mouldy stone ceiling. "She's so androgynous though. She had scars, all here," she motioned to her own front. "It's scary to think she survived that, considering there hasn't been a hospital for twenty years now."

Skulduggery nodded silently and continued to pour over his maps. He shuffled through a series of them, looking for the African Cradle map that was riddle with coloured lines and vague circles.

"Will this war ever end?" He heard Valkyrie murmur quietly. He stopped his work, his non-existing eyes still focused on the map he had picked up.

"Valkyrie," Skulduggery leaned forward over the desk, his skull an indication of complete seriousness. "This _will_ end, I promise you."

"It's just, after Darq-"

"You need to stop blaming yourself," he interrupted her quietly. "We had no way of knowing what the future would be if we killed Darquesse, okay? We just have to be happy that this is the chance we've been given."

Valkyrie couldn't face him. She looked away at the worn floor. "Sometimes I wish Darquesse had destroyed this world. It would have been fast and painless, instead of _this_." She planted her face in her hands, and sounded miserable. "Now there are children like Phoenix the Ash whose parents explode in their faces and they've never seen a bathroom, or had a hot shower."

Skulduggery stared at her some more before banging the edges of his maps against the table, straightening them. The door opened with a quiet groan and both detectives looked up to see who was entering.

Short, shaggy brown hair and a pair of yellow eyes peered around the edge of the door which then exploded in. "Scarred dude said skullman wanted me," she announced.

"Ah, yes, quite," said Skulduggery darkly, looking at the cleaned teen up and down. She was wearing a tight white shirt under her opened jacket, showing a row of abs through the fabric. Her hair was a lot cleaner, and her skin a waxy-bronze now that the dirt was removed. She wore semi-fitted blue jeans and boots. "Come here," he waved for her to stand in front of his desk. She did so hesitantly, and frowned when Skulduggery leaned over and sniffed the air around her.

Skulduggery tapped the gap of his nose and nodded. "Well, at least you're not an offense to the nose anymore."

Phoenix the Ash stood there, bemused.

"Anyways, I need you to mark out where you send your shipments of explosives."

"Ey," she snapped sharply, her yellows eyes flashing in the dim light. "I wanna know I'll be free before I go tellin you where."

"Well, you'll be free in a sense," Skulduggery explained evenly. "But you'll be sticking around; just so we can be sure you're not feeding us false information."

Phoenix the Ash blinked. "You're shittin me!?I'll be killed if anyone sees I'm with Irish folk and they're you."

"That's why you're joining our cause," he reasoned.

"What!?" The teen took several steps back. "I can't fight in a war! I'm just a survivor, I run away from dang'rous shit."

Skulduggery motioned to the room. "You'll be safe inside the Sanctuary. It's cloaked and it teleports to several other locations throughout Ireland. Plus, you'll be have a bed and food on regular intervals. In exchange for your information and your cooperation, of course."

"Fuck it," Phoenix the Ash clicked her tongue heatedly, tapping the dull carpet lightly with her feet. "Fine, fine, I'll show ya. But it's dang'rous, real bad."

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**My best friend, before she moved (sad face :C) was freakishly androgynous - to the point that she could swing quite literally from one gender to the other, and other girls thought she was a man (one girl, i kid not, asked her out :/ it was awkward) Before I met her I really didn't believe in people being allowed to swing from genders and gender preferences. But then there's always that person who changes your point of view :)  
**

**If you've got a word or comment I'd love to hear it! :D Bah Bai**


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